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20 October, 2013

Mini Manchester Shopping Haul + Big City Living

This week saw my first salary land into my newly created English bank account. It was a good feeling. It was a good feeling because I'm still waiting on my national insurance number and I felt pretty confident that I wasn't going to see a penny for another four weeks. So hell to the yeah!

In celebration of this unexpected surprise, I took a shopping trip into the city centre and braved the crowds. The one thing I did not expect about moving to Manchester was how the big crowds and the even bigger shops would make me feel overwhelmed at times. In the past, one of my favourite treats was to pop on down to Boots on payday, grab one of those nifty blue baskets and buy a heap of products like no one was watching. This has recently changed.

Boots, located in the Arndale Shopping Centre, can only be described as an "overload of the senses!". Don't get me wrong, it offers everything a girl ever dreamed of, reams of makeup, every skincare product you ever wanted and items you didn't think existed, but as soon as you walk in those doors, there are sales consultants ready to pounce. Some might say it's comparable to the African wilderness.

I was literally pounced on the second I picked up my first product of choice. "Everything ok there, can I help you with anything?". "I'm fine, thanks", I grumpily replied and kept wandering avoiding eye contact with anyone who remotely looked like they worked there. I was pounced another three times, before I gave up my joy of boots shopping and shuffled off to the checkout. My afternoon of lotion and potion shopping over.

I understand they're only doing their job, I do. They most likely have a ferocious boss who is pushing them all to sell, sell, sell, and reach unreachable sales targets, but pleeeeease lovely sales people of boots, you're taking the joy out of 'boots browsing' and ' boots shopping' for me. It is literally one of my favourite past times. They boy felt so sorry for me, he hunted out some mini boots stores so that my love for boots wasn't completely destroyed.

However despite feeling like prey to a bunch of beauty care lions, I did pick up a few items which were hurriedly popped into my basket, all the while, avoiding the pride. In no particular order, we have

- Liz Earle Cleanse & Polish (Hot Cloth Cleanser)

- Liz Earle Skin Repair Moisturiser (Dry / Sensitive skin)

- Liz Earle Daily Eye Repair

- St Ives - Apricot Scrub

- Aussie 3 Minute Miracle Reconstructor

- Soap & Glory - The Righteous Butter

With the exception of the Aussie hair product, you're probably seeing a bit of a theme....skincare! My skin as really suffered in recent years. Although I look after it as if its my religion, there are fine lines appearing and sans makeup, I have a very pale, blotchy completion. Think, pink nose, a scattering of red spots and uneven skin tone. It needs help and I've decided to try an experiment. I'm going to scrub once a day (I don't normally do this) and use only the Liz Earle products on my face for one month. It will feature as a future blog post, so hopefully I'll have some positive results worth reporting on.

I'll also review the 3 Minute Miracle Resconstructor (my hair currently feels like straw!) and the body moisturizer, The Righteous Butter as I'm feeling the effects of colder weather on my skin.

**Have you noticed the broke lid on the Liz Earle moisturizer, yup, in my excitement, I managed to drop it and crack the lid!**

**Shortly after writing this blog post, I then dropped a glass of wine. I'm most definitley having one of those days**